{"id":32128,"date":"2022-10-27T22:17:44","date_gmt":"2022-10-28T02:17:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=32128"},"modified":"2022-10-27T22:17:50","modified_gmt":"2022-10-28T02:17:50","slug":"theatre-auroras-mother-of-the-maid-is-historical-exploration-for-director","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/theatre-auroras-mother-of-the-maid-is-historical-exploration-for-director\/","title":{"rendered":"Theatre Aurora\u2019s \u201cMother of the Maid\u201d is historical exploration for director"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Kay Valentine has always been a history buff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the theatre, they are the kinds of stories she tends to gravitate towards \u2013 and if there are some unanswered questions that require a deep dive into research of her own, so much the better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And this was the case with Mother of the Maid, which is on now through Saturday, October 29, at Theatre Aurora.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mother of the Maid, a play written by Jane Anderson, is the story of Joan of Arc\u2019s mother, a peasant woman whose faith comes into sharp focus as her sainted daughter answered the call.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s just the latest character exploration that Valentine has helmed for Theatre Aurora and it\u2019s the first production of their 2022-2023 season that is united by the theme of \u201cThe Mighty Heroine,\u201d where Joan of Arc certainly fits the bill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI thought I knew all about Joan of Arc, but here I realized that I didn\u2019t \u2013 and for, me, that\u2019s the fascination,\u201d says Valentine. \u201cI had to do some research myself to find out how accurate this play was based on [mother Isabelle Rom\u00e9e\u2019s] life. For the actress playing Isabelle, Janny Gogen Esch, it\u2019s the journey she had to take from the frustrated mother of a rebellious teenager to watching her child go to be burned and yet keep her faith. For her father, Jacques d\u2019Arc, (played by Peter Shipston) he was not used to this rebellious girl. His boys were pretty obedient and he didn\u2019t believe in all the church. He was not as strong a Catholic as his wife was, so his journey was to come to terms with what his daughter was doing and, in the end, to try and support her as best as he could.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor Arin Hincer, who is playing our wonderful Joan, for her it was finding how to portray this rebellious teenager at the beginning who turns her back on her mother and sasses her, to facing death by burning and yet refusing to give up her faith. She is an incredible young actress and she did a really great job.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also doing significant behind-the-scenes work on the production, she adds, are several Theatre Aurora members who rarely get the credit that\u2019s due.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI really wish the backstage crew would get more credit because you don\u2019t see them, but we have two teenage people who are doing all the set changes and there are a lot of things to do because of very quick scene changes and they have to make sure that the right thing is there at the right time. The lighting and tech people, without those people plays could not go on. The actors could not learn their lines but if nobody is there to turn the lights on, hit the music button, to bring them the right prop, they\u2019re helpless.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Valentine worked with her cast to bring the story to life, she encouraged them to look further into the time period and research what was going on in the world at the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In turn, with her focus on accuracy, she says she hopes audiences leave with a better understanding as well of \u201cmotherhood and mother love.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is really about a mother\u2019s fierce, fierce love of her daughter,\u201d she says. \u201cThis is a very strong female play. The mother and Joan are just very iconic characters, really.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more information on Mother of the Maid, including tickets and showtimes, as well as further information on Theatre Aurora\u2019s 2022-2023 season, visit www.theatreaurora.com.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kay Valentine has always been a history buff. In the theatre, they are the kinds of stories she tends to gravitate towards \u2013 and if there are some unanswered questions that require a deep dive into research of her own, so much the better. And this was the case with Mother of the Maid, which […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":32129,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27,4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-and-culture","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/2022-10-27-04.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-8mc","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-19 06:24:32","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32128","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32128"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32128\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32129"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}